Sunday 26th June - SW Super League practice match Lower Bristol Avon

This was the first major match on the Lower Bristol Avon of the new season. The section used was Swineford to Jack Whites and 44 Anglers were booked in. The draw was at 08:30 with fishing 11:00 - 16:00 due to some long walks as there is only really three points of access and gear needs to be lifted over Kissing Gates and Styles. There were payouts for the top 4 and 4 sections of 5 and one of 4, each paying out £50 which is the way to go I believe.
4 of us from the Team were taking part, Chris, Lewis, Rob and myself even though Chris and I are away for a few weeks from 2nd July.
We were near the front of the due when the draw was called so a quick get away in order to park. Lewis was in front of me and pulled out peg 9 at Swineford, second field and I pulled 7 so we were both in the same section. I did fancy it even though these were not the usual permanent pegs.
On arrival and after we had loaded up we had to go through the first field of uncut grass which was knee high followed by doing a series of lifts with other anglers to get the gear over the Kissing Gate. I was a the first peg directly after the gate.
The river was well coloured due to the previous days storms and it was a very steep climb down the steps cut in the bank to get down near the water.

The picture does not give the full extent of the gradient down the bank.

I toyed with just standing up but made the decision to take the box down the bank and setting up more comfortably which resulted in straining my back.

I set up a feeder rod and a topper float for down the middle as straight out in front of me the river came back on itself and was very shallow compared to around 6' in the middle. The pole was out of the question as the bank behind me was too steep and close.

Due to the colour and location you had to give it a go for the bream. While fishing the tip for 2 hours I fed the middle with hemp and caster. 

it must have been on about my 8 cast with the tip I had a big drop back bite and I connected with something really solid on the strike which moved a few feet and then the line went slack. The hook length had been bitten through so Mr Pike must have liked the whole dendra. 

Lots of taps were experienced on the tip and I got plagued with tiny fish and not even hooking them.

The tip rod went up the bank and first trot down with the float I had a roach of around 4 ozs. 

Sensas 88 captain Lance Tucker who was below me came up for a walk. I knew he had been mainly concentrating on the tip but said he had only bits but did loose a bream.

I carried on with the float and after a while fed small nuggets of ground bait laced with hemp and caster and with caster on the hook started putting a few fish together although no netters.

I was enjoying the day even though in terms of the overall match I was going nowhere.

I know it was only a 5 peg section but as you can see from the weigh board it was very close. Nick Johns above me spent more time on the float and his swim lended more towards it.

On reflection ..... I should have spent more time on the float, stood up rather than take all my gear down the bank, perhaps set up a long whip.

The middle section threw up a couple of big bream weights as expected with a 44 lb plus net and there was a another with over 30 lbs and a couple of 20 lbs.

Fellow Blogger Tim Ford was also fishing, his report and view of the match can be found at cluckerspeg.blogspt.co.uk

Well I might get out this week before my trip to the States on Saturday but no more matches until Sunday 24th July, it will be on the River Huntspill.

Sunday 19th June - Clevedon Club Match River Kenn.

This was the first match of the river season and I was really looking forward to it following my catch of 7 bream on opening day. There were only 10 booked in for this match which included a few new members which is good for the Clubs bank balance. I was surprised there was not a few more as we had a lot of interest at the back end of last season due to the river producing massive bags of roach. The bream that were being caught on the days prior to this match had been well published on Facebook.
I drew peg 3 which was a permanent peg down near the sea wall and was happy as it was also an end peg. My team mate and captain Chris Hook (new member on the day) drew next to me on peg 4. I think this was only the second time Chris had fished the river so he followed me down the road to a close parking area within the residential area which runs along the river path. We park in the 'Tynings' and you could not have got any closer to our pegs, 5 minute walk.
On arrival at the pegs there was a downstream wind blowing, despite this I still set up a waggler rod as well as the feeder and pole at 13 meters for down the middle. Chris next door just set up the feeder and pole.
On the ''all in'' I started on the waggler spraying caster and hemp to try and get a few fish in the next as there was the odd roach and chub topping. Chris on the other hand went straight on the feeder putting in a few casts first to get some bait into his selected area three quarters the way across.
The waggler proved a bit difficult due to the wind and after 30 minutes or so it went up the bank behind me and Chris had a couple of bream as well.
Out went the feeder towards a tree on the far side and just downstream with a small red worm and red maggot. A few casts later the tip went around and a good bream was on only to come off half way across. A few casts later and the tip flew around again, picked the rod up and it was solid with that thumping feeling indicating ... bream on. It was a good fish of around 5lbs so I was off the mark. Chris mean while had a added a few more! Another bream quickly followed for me, it was another good fish and more like 6lbs. Within 10 minutes I had another but lost it due to thick marginal weed to my left, it was my fault for not controlling it better. I added a few more perch, roach and eels but no more bream.
Chris ended up with 14 bream, 13 on the feeder and 1 on the pole and I knew he had won the day.

Chris with his fantastic bream catch of just over 71lbs

Gary Cross suffered a lot of liners on the day but ended up with over 45lbs

Bread and Whip expert Scott Smallwood was third with over 35lbs and included a nice hybrid

Club Chairman Steve Bonwick had over 18lbs for 4th including some nice skimmers

My 2 bream and bits went over 15lbs for 5th

The river fished really well on the day, fish responded to a number of methods, I will be looking to have a few outings during the weekdays over the coming months.

Great value for £20 senior and £5 for a junior which also includes the Bristol Avon, Swineford to Jack Whites.

Thursday 16th June - River Kenn Clevedon

It's been a few years since I was able to visit a River on the ''glorious 16th'' due to work. Not anymore.
Last year at the start of the season the River Kenn fished it's socks off with good bags of big bream. I got Angling Times to give it a mention in their Where to Fish section just prior to the rivers opening and it was named as one of the top 5 rivers in the region.
I was up reasonably early (06:00) and out the door by 06:45 arriving in Strode Rd Clevedon at 07:20 after calling into the local garage for a pasty and drink.  I had an idea of where I wanted to fish and was surprised to only find two anglers halfway down the stretch toward the sea wall. They had slept out all night after pre-baiting two swims but only had a hybrid to show for their efforts. I settled on a fairly wide swim, think it was peg 24 and on a bend, the wooden peg was still there but the number unreadable.
I had the tackle with me but chose to set up a waggled and a feeder rod. There was little or no flow and a slight downstream breeze.
My waggler float was a 3AA clear drennan crystal on 4lb main line with 2 bulk no.8's and a no. 10 below on the 0.13 hook length to a 18 forged hook.
I was fishing by 08:30 ish and began on the waggler loose feeding hemp and caster with double red maggot on the hook. After about 30 minutes I had a small dip in the float but missed the bite. 15 minutes later I had a better bite and missed that as well. I was expecting at least a perch early on but was beginning to wonder.
Around 09:30 the float sailed away and I knew from the resistance on the other end it was a bream. at this point a guy came along and stopped to watch, he had been a freshwater angler and knew the Kenn well but was now a sea fisherman. My maver elite 13 foot match rod handled the bream brilliantly and after 5 minutes it was netted.

My first fish of the 2016 river season

I kept feeding just a few caster and grains of hemp and after 10 minutes I had another bream, bit bigger this time and around 5lbs. It was great catching this size of fish on the waggler in 7' of water. 

Club Secretary Barry Fowler came down and asked me how I was getting on and was pleased to hear the bream where about. Barry settled in a peg a few pegs upstream. By 10:30 and just as a friend came down to see how the Kenn fishes this time of year I landed bream number 6. As he sat down only a few minutes passed when he noticed Barry was landing a bream on the pole. 

I added one more bream before noon and the waggler became impossible to fish as the wind change to an upstream one and much stronger. I did have a few chucks on the straight lead and the feeder but got bored.

Barry had been adding a few more bream on the pole so I decided to set it up. No bream but I had a few good eels.

I called it a day around 14:00 and was happy with my 7 good fish for around 35lbs.

Good start to the river season

When I left barry had 6 plus a few big eels.

The Club have a match on the river on Sunday 19th June so looking forward to that.

Sunday 12th June - SW Super League Round 1 Gloucester Canal, Hempstead to Pilot

I was looking forward to Round 1 and with 8 Teams of 8 taking part in the League there was always going to be a good turn out on the natural venues selected.
We had to borrow a couple of anglers for this round as a few of our guys were committed on family business etc but this was sorted out a week in advance.
Captain Chris Hook done the draw for us and informed me I was on 27 at Hempstead, I had never fished the early pegs on this stretch but word was it was going to be hard. New signing rob had 47 so was looking for a few fish. Nothing notable for the other guys at all. Team mate Sean was 8 pegs above me and I walked down the same stretch of tow path as him. His peg did not look good and was right opposite a boat dry dock, a few pegs down was welsh wizard Clive Branson with tree cover and a big lily pad in front of him, nice.
I got to my peg and it looked pretty crap with little cover on the far side and right on the far bank was a garage forecourt!

Anyway job to do so set up the standard pole rigs, one at 13 meters down the track and one just off the near shelf at about 9 meters. Down the track it was just under top 5 deep and on the shorter line around 12'. A Feeder was also set up for the far side and around 2 meters off the bank. During the time I was setting up a few decent fish rolled.

The peg was right on the tow path so had to keep the gear tight and tidy.

Boat traffic in the form of rowers was busy to say the least 

Pole lines were fed with just a couple of balls of chop and caster with a few dead pinkies added.

Bite's on the Feeder usually come quite early but after an hour there had not been any indications at all. Looking down toward Richard Candy on the next peg I hadn't seen him catch either. 

The short pole line was tried just after an hour in and I had a small skimmer of around 4 ozs straight away followed by a ruffe (bad sign).

I feed a few loose caster on the short line and tried the track, nothing (all match).

The match was spent swapping between the inside line and the feeder with very poor results, the weigh board for my Section shows how hard it was.

One to forget for me. Team wise we had 3 guys pick up money and we finished 5th out of 8. Next round is n a few weeks on the Bristol Avon, Crane Section with a practice match the week before.

The glorious 16th sees me on the River Kenn followed by a Club match on the same river Sunday 19th June.

Sunday 5th June - SW Super League Practice Match Gloucester Canal

The SW Super League starts officially next Sunday, the first match is on the Gloucester Canal. I think organiser Mark Treasure had 52 booked in to fish this practice but there were 5 no shows. Mark spread the anglers from Hempstead down to the Pilot Inn as these are the Sections to be used next week (although he may make some changes following todays match.
team Captain Chris Hook, new signing Rob Wood and I fished todays match, the others had previous engagements but are OK for next week.
The weather was already glorious at 08:00 and the forecast was for a very hot day so there would be lots out walking and cycling the tow path as well as a high number of boats on the water.
At the draw Chris drew peg 47 at Hempstead, a great draw and he was looking to break his recent duck of 2 blanks on the trot on the canal. I was behind him and drew 209 at Rea, really poor area as I had done some weighing in on this Section on one of the Teams of 4 Spring League recently. Rob did not do much better and pulled out peg 219. But .... hey the pay out was top 2 in the Sections and top 3 overall to spread the money about.
It was a fairly long walk to the peg but we had plenty of time to set up before the 10:30 ''all in''.
My peg was virtually on the towpath leaving little room to ship the pole back so I opted for just an 11 meter line at about 14:00, it was just on the shelf with around 12 feet of water. Two Feeder Rods were also set up, one clipped up to fish at the bottom of the far shelf and the other for down the track.
My ground bait was green fish meal for both feeder lines and the pole line was simply chopped worm and caster with dead pinkie squeezed together and cupped in.
On the all in everyone started on the far feeder line after baiting up their other area's. An hour passed and I had not seen a fish of any description caught. Many were out on the pole now but I decided to give it another 20 minutes. Nothing happened.
I went out on the 11 meter line with double dead red. I did see a couple of small eels being caught but no fish. 20 minutes in and after lifting and dropping the bait the float buried and a healthy about of No.5 elastic came out...fish on. A family stopped directly behind me to watch and I had to give them instructions were to stand so as not to get in the way. A decent hybrid of just under a 1lb was netted.
No more fish followed in the next hour on this line so I swapped between the far and middle feeder lines with no indications whatsoever.
The pole line had been topped up little and ofter and as soon as I went back on it around 14:00 I had a bite which resulted in a Ruffe. Well it broke the boredom. I also took a small eel on this line 15 minutes later. I still had not seen any fish caught and some anglers were away from their pegs or packing up.
The angler above me came down and was thinking of packing up as he only had 2 eels but decided he would have a walk down our Section to see how it was fishing first. He came back up 20 minutes later and said very very little had been caught and was going to stick it out, the time was now around 14:45 with the match ending at 15:30.
I had no more fish but he had another eel 10 minutes from the end.
The weigh in started but I could not see who was in my Section as peg 207 and 209 (we all had a peg in-between us) was being weighed in with the Section above.
The only angler I knew of in my Section weighed 1lb 4oz, I weighed 1lb 3oz! That eel he had before the end could affect the result.
The results were being done back at the Pilot Inn so I gave Chris a call to see if he was going back. He had done well, weighing 14lb plus and just beaten off the next peg who had 17lb plus. At this point we were not sure if there were any bigger weights but I said I would see him back at the pub.
It turned out Chris came 2nd overall picking up £90 and I got 2nd in my Section so a £30 pick-up, cannot believe I got done into 2nd by a late eel. my Section fished the hardest so don't want that next week. all the better weights came from Hempstead surprise surprise.
No pictures and there was nothing worth taking a pic off down my end.
New Team mate Rob had 10oz.

Probably pleasure fish on the Gloucester Canal Tuesday and then Bristol Docks match Thursday night.

Thursday 2nd June - Bristol City Docks 'evening knock up' Baltic Wharf.

This was my 5th go at the Thursday evening 'knock up' match in the city docks currently being held at Baltic Wharf.
I had it in my head to fish long tonight and try and tempt one or two of the bream that are making an appearance. Leading up to the day I was going to fish short ... this sort of explains perhaps why i am getting it wrong ..... cannot make up my mind. It is a moody venue and no two weeks have been the same.
This week I was in-between Pete Sivell and in form Dave Wilmott. At least I would see up close how these two regulars fished.
I must have put in at least 6 balls of caster and hemp laced ground bait at the start and about fourth put in had a net skimmer. Dave was catching the odd fish short (5 meters) and Pete who usually starts on the straight lead over ground bait at 13 meters had a nice skimmer as well, bigger than mine.
I caught the odd small fish and a couple of eels along with a small flounder but was going nowhere fast. Peter really started to put a nice net together when he came in on the 5 meter line which included a dog roach of 1lb 10ozs.
After 9 p.m. the end pegs towards the dock gates started to produce a few bream, they would definitely have a big impact on the results.
I tipped back what I had just after the all out (no more than 2lbs).
Jason Bird won the evening with 2  bream and bits for over 13lbs, caught I believe at 6 or 7 meters.

Jason with his winning bag.

SW Super League practice on the Gloucester Canal on Sunday with the first official match in the league the Sunday after.

Need to sort out my act for next Thursday night!

Wednesday 1st June - Pleasure session Gloucester Canal Purton

I only decided to return to the Gloucester Canal at Purton on the Tuesday morning after a quick call to Toby in Cadbury Angling who confirmed he had some caster. Tuesday afternoon saw me making the short trip down to Congressbury to pick up 1 pint caster, 1/2 pint of pinkie, 1/2 pint of red maggot and 2kg of fishmeal ground bait. I raided the wormery at home for hook bait and also had a tin of hemp and sweetcorn.
This morning I was up early and out the door by 06:45 arriving in Purton by 07:20. It did not take long to load the barrow and I only took 2 ready made up Feeder Rods. The weather looked perfect for bream fishing, an overcast sky, light wind and about 15 degree's. There was a small chance of rain but nothing serious.
Again I was the only angler on the bank and settled into the same swim as last week opposite the first log pond on the far bank. The fishmeal ground bait was mixed up on the bank and left to settle while putting the rest of the tackle together.
I was ready by 08:30 including giving the ground bait another wetting and riddle. The reel line was already clipped up at the correct distance.

A good selection of baits for the session.

i knew from the previous weeks session that it was not that deep on the far side so mixed up the fishmeal fairly dry but moist enough to hold in the 25 grm cage feeder along with a mix of caster hemp and pinkie. 

Given the quality of the fish I caught last week a 14 hook to 0.15 hook length was the starting point and I loaded the hook with a dendra of about 4 inches tipped with a red maggot. No indication on the first cast after 5 minutes so re-cast and had what looked like a liner. On the third cast the tip flew around and a small perch was the result. Next cast the tip started to rattle no sooner had the feeder hit the bottom and I knew it was small fish. This went on for about 90 minutes and I was not adding anything of any quality and began to get frustrated. 

I took a couple of phone calls and around 09:45 put two big pieces of worm on and was prepared to sit it out and added more corn in the feeder. It was if someone flicked a switch, the tip slowing went around and I hit a solid fish which I knew to be a bream. It was a nice dark fish of around 4lbs and very clean indicating spawning was at an end. 

I had to wait another 20 minutes for the next bite and it was another good bream, a right bin lid of almost 5lbs.

At this point another angler turned up and settled two swims above me. I had a quick chat with him as I am alway keen to gain more info on the canal. He confirmed it was a good area all year round and the stretch in-between the two Log Ponds fishes well. He walked back up to his swim and I hot another good bite and bream number 3 was netted.

The next 3 hours saw me get a steady run of good fish, like I said they were all very clean and with no hook marks on them at all.

Looking up an down the canal at the wild life occasionally it made me realise what a vast expanse of water the Gloucester Canal is and there is so much of it virtually unfished on a regular basis, the walks are worth it.

Just after 14:00 I decided to call it a day in order to give me enough time to pack up, walk to the car and head back down the M5.

I asked the other angler to take a quick photo of my catch. 

21 bream in all plus a few bits, well over 70lbs

This is how close the Severn Estuary is to the canal, picture taken from the tow path.

Bristol City Docks 'knock up' Thursday night and back on the Gloucester Canal on Sunday for a SW Super League practice match.